4 Advent Sunday

Everything about this hermitage fills me with joy. There are lots of things that could have been far more perfect one way or the other — ascetically and ‘domestically.” But it is the place God has given me after so much prayer and longing — but without my deserving it — and it is a delight. I can imagine no other joy on earth than to have a hermitage and to be at peace in it, to live in silence, to think and write, to listen to the wind and to all the voices of the wood, to live in the shadow of the big cedar cross, to prepare for my death and my exodus to the heavenly country, to love my brothers and all people, and to pray for the whole world and for peace and good sense among men. So it is “my place” in the scheme of things, and that is sufficient!

— Thomas Merton in A Year with Thomas Merton: Daily Meditations from His Journals by Jonathan Montald

Today: Consider why God might be telling you right now, “You’re in the right place at the right time in your life.” What are those things in your life that make you nod your head, “yes” and helps you understand what you’re going through. Can you embrace your place in the scheme of things?